[Modified: added Review Answer Panel]
Hey guys!
Thank you for your patience and all these heartwarming reviews.
I just want to say that I didn't abandon this story. Don't worry. My life has been pretty busy, and I didn't have much time to write. That said, here is the next chapter of my story.
Enjoy!
Review Answer Panel (TBC?)
Hello! Here, I will answer all your inquiries in your reviews as best as I can without spoiling the story. :)
- Vermouth and Ano Kata: Some of you have been wondering about the relationship between these two. I can tell you that they do have a special connection. Sometimes, knowing the origin of some family names in my fanfic can help. The rest is to be found out!
- Rei = vampire? Perhaps? Perhaps not? ;)
- Chapter 1: Vermouth said that Ano Kata can't kill her?! (Sharp eyes, Actress Chris vineyard.) It is related to eternal youth, but not completely. You're on the right track.
Reminder: the names, places and other elements in the story are fruits of fiction. Any resemblances to reality are coincidences.
Chapter 3 - Call of the Phoenix
A bar, New York, USA, late 1970s
"Same as always?" the bartender asked as she reached for a couple of bottles in the back.
"Yeah," Shari replied as she, exhausted, leaned against the wooden counter.
" 'Business must be going well. The guys are all crazy for you," the bartender continued as she shifted her gaze to some drunk clients who were staring at Shari lecherously.
"That's good," Shari answered indifferently as she wiped her sweat with a handkerchief. At the suggestion of the bar owner, who had noticed the opportunity in turning the run-down bar into a flourishing business thanks to her performances, Shari had sung and danced longer than ever. Now, she would love to sit down if the chairs weren't reserved for clients.
"Here you go, hon."
"Thanks, Daisy," Shari replied before downing the whole glass of cocktail. The faintly sweet, but caustic liquid burned her tongue and throat. She loved this sensation. It kept her alive in this disgusting, infectious world of 'living deads'.
It was perhaps by chance that she decided to glance toward the broken door during this fateful second.
The wooden door, with fading paint and blurry glasses, creaked inaudibly as a man entered the cacophony. His looks, attire and gait were so ordinary at first sight that he would seem invisible had he walked across a stage during a performance by others.
Nevertheless, as Shari observed more thoroughly this new guest, she realized that the man was rather unique in appearance, and this 'supernatural' power of concealment was the fruit of the man's own wits.
The man was so tall that his gaze seemed to be permanently filled with disdain as he glanced down at the tiny world and its simple-minded 'runts'. However, this man rarely glanced at others and never in their eyes, not out of shyness, but of slyness. By avoiding bothering others, even with his gaze, the man received the same unspoken favor in return.
The man sat at a table and placed an order for the servant in a voice so low that it seemed conspiratorial. Compared to the other clients, who spoke with loud voices and exaggerated motion, especially in their drunken states, the man looked like a statue, only moving his lips when talking or the necessary muscles to perform his tasks.
As his arms rested on the table, Shari could distinguish hints of bumps under the long sleeves, indicating muscles strengthened by years of training.
A cop? Shari thought as she took the refilled glass from Daisy. The man was too... unique to be one of the street gangsters hanging around the district.
"Who's the new guy?"
"Not really new. 'Just had stopped hanging around before you worked here," Daisy replied as she fetched the bottles needed for the man's order. "You've heard of the Black Snakes?"
"No."
"Not familiar with the underworld, hon?"
"It's never interesting."
Daisy smiled mysteriously. "That guy, she began as she lifted her chin toward the man's direction, is the boss of the Black Snakes, the leading group in the district."
"Now that's interesting." Shari had been with influential politicians and businessmen. How hard would it be to steal a gang leader's heart?
" 'Word of advice: don't try your luck, hon. There's word going around that you can only join him, but never leave him."
"Oh?"
Daisy leaned forward, breathing on Shari's ear, and whispered, "This man killed all his former lovers." Daisy then leaned back and resumed her ordinary voice, "So take my advice to heart, will you, hon?"
However, it was already too late. Shari, like a moth, mesmerized by the candlelight, circling its way toward the flame of doom, had decided to serve the man his drink.
"Shari, hon, I love you, you know that? You'll be landing straight into a death trap."
"Well, it won't be different from this life," Shari replied with her gaze already set on her target.
She heard Daisy sigh, but she couldn't care less. She knew that this man was the 'right one'. Perhaps the man was then only a New York gang leader wanted by the police, but Shari could feel a unique hidden strength in him that would transform him into or bring her to the most influential man she would have the chance to meet. All her life had been "all or nothing", and she was ready to take a gamble.
"Here you go," Shari announced as she put the glass in front of the man, who seemed indifferent to her action. "You seem new here. I'm Shari. If you stay a bit longer, you'll see me sing."
Eyes locked on an invisible object in front of him, the man took a sip from the glass, but didn't say a word.
"Mind if I join you?"
At the man's silence, Shari pulled the chair next to him and was about to sit down when the man finally spoke in an impassive tone, "Hasn't your friend over there (He glanced toward Daisy.) talked about me?"
So he was watching us... no, he was watching everything, although he never seemed to. Such a sly man.
"Yeah. She told me that you're a dangerous man."
"Doesn't that frighten you?"
"It excites me."
"You sure are a young one," the man noticed with an amused smile.
"Then, show me just how dangerous things can be."
The man kept his smile, and, for the first time, stared in Shari's eyes with his gaze that seemed to read and mock even the most hidden thought of its victim. Anyone unprepared would have looked away, but Shari had predicted this man's frightening power and stared back with her trademark seductive smile.
From her countless encounters, Shari knew that the man would sooner or later acknowledge her, but, perhaps she really was too young to understand that she had more to lose than she thought.
Japan, present
The train station was filled with busy travelers, armed with business attire, suitcases and handbags. Everyone had too many dreams and destinations in mind to stop and observe others. No one had thus noticed the silver-haired man concealed by his black trenchcoat. The man leaned still against a circular pillar, holding a lit cigarette between his fingers. His eyes, glittering in the shadow of his black fedora, surveyed the crowd with their dark glance conveying nicotine-suppressed madness.
"How was the little reunion?" a female voice asked with a hint of irony.
From the corner of his eye, the man noticed a black wig, a fake nose, and colored contacts, all worn with such expertise that they seemed to be part of their owner. The man could feel his blood boil. He didn't particularly dislike the remark. Rather, he despised the woman, herself, and her mysterious, intimate relationship with the man he respected the most. As a child, he had thought that he was the one that that person trusted the most, but his delusion was destroyed when he had caught, by chance, a unique glance that that person - whose impassible expression had become his trademark - had given to the woman. A small flame of irritation had begun burning in him and grew into a dark fire of loathing as he witnessed countless times when that person only confided to her.
He knew that, if she provoked him more with her trademark irritating smile, even nicotine couldn't help with his barely mitigated bloodthirst. He decided to go straight to the point.
"Ano Kata is growing impatient."
"He is," the woman agreed lightly.
"We'll proceed to Plan B."
"That's pretty conspicuous."
"We don't have much time for a cat and mouse chase. We need the mouse to come out of its own. We just need to do a better cleaning job," he finished.
The woman was silent. Although he could not read her expression, he knew that she was in disagreement.
That's too bad, he thought with a feeling of triumph that he knew was immature. At least, the bloodthirst was gone.
The next day
Perhaps he really was turning into a vampire.
As far as Rei could remember, in both his careers as a detective and BO member - who sometimes had to fight bloody battles, he never held an attraction toward blood. He was even disgusted by blood as a dish, when he first tasted a blood curd in a hot pot restaurant.
Thus, Rei couldn't believe that, the night before, he had committed such an outrageous act. Although Shiho didn't mean what she said, she still hinted Rei toward a possible explanation for his strange behavior.
Wait... what am I thinking? Vampires don't exist... How could Rei, a detective - or guardian of scientific reasoning, even think of justifying a phenomenon through theories concerning supernatural creatures?
Still, faced with choosing between a dead end and an unscientific theory, Rei decided that the latter was better. This choice led him to his current position, which seemed completely professional to the confused policemen and totally foolish to any experienced sane detectives, had one walked by.
Kneeling near the fresh gory corpse whose death once again proved a detective's nature as a 'death magnet', Rei slowly leaned toward the red puddle spreading from behind the body. Inspired by popular movies and novels, Rei told himself that, if he indeed turned into a vampire, he wouldn't resist the temptation of drinking such a large quantity of blood.
"Um..."
Rei slightly turned his head toward the origin of the sound, a boy young enough to be a novice in the field who shyly asked, "Is there something special about the blood?"
"Just making sure," Rei managed to answer in a professional tone. The boy seemed satisfied with the answer and stayed observing with intellectual curiosity his 'mentor' before he was called by a higher ranking officer.
Rei steadily leaned closer to the puddle. His nose was now so close to the blood and the thank-God-not-yet-rotten body that it seemed to touch the ground. He could detect, among other body and material odors, the ferric scent of blood.
Still no reaction...
"This won't do."
Rei flinched. The owner of the voice had approached him with such discretion when Rei's mind was preoccupied that he didn't detect anyone. Even more surprising and worrying was the meaning of the words.
"What do you mean?" Rei began cautiously as he turned his gaze toward a seemingly more experienced policeman. For a second, Rei thought he distinguished mischief in the man's eyes.
"The blood. If you have suspicions, we should send it to the lab and get it analyzed."
So, I was just paranoid. He's just an ordinary policeman who's serious about his work.
Rei suddenly felt at peace and added with a more confident tone, "You're right. I was confirming something. I just don't want the forensic team to waste its efforts."
"That's considerate of yours, the man began, but don't take too much time. Sometimes, an extraordinary thing is so well hidden that you need 'special' means to find it."
The policeman's words were becoming arcane and off-topic. As Rei concentrated his thoughts on the man, he could suddenly detect a familiar aura. Rei was then sure that the mischievous glance wasn't part of his imagination.
'He' isn't a policeman.
"Thanks for the advice," he began with a smirk. "You seem pretty knowledgeable in this field, especially about this murder, he added with emphasis. Mind giving me some hints?"
"Seems like a bad case of robbery with a lot of struggle."
"It certainly is, and you must have had a lot of fun," Rei remarked with irony.
Suddenly, the austere expression of the policeman turned into a seductively mischievous one. Even the 'man's' tone changed into that of 'his' true self.
"That's rude," Vermouth replied with playfulness. "I'm more refined than this."
So, she's in charge of the clean-up.
"Come to think of it, this body reeks of alcohol... perhaps of gin," Rei finished as he glanced inquisitively toward Vermouth. A secretive smile appeared on her face.
So, it is him... but why?
He got his answer when a familiar trio - an old man, a hulk and a blonde with glasses - approached the crime scene. Rei felt his mouth turn bitter at the invasion.
The FBI. Why didn't they leave Japan?
Rei didn't have much time to express his disagreement with the FBI's involvement, before the chief officer let the trio take over the case under the claim that the victim was one of their agents. Rei's only consolation was that he now was sure of his guess about the motive.
An undercover agent who wasn't careful enough... Rei thought as he took one last look of the body.
As he headed toward his home, his mind was then suddenly occupied by the 'policeman's' strange riddle.
No, I don't have time for this. Rei still had to catch Shiho after school. Her mood didn't seem to have improved enough during the previous night for him to apologize effectively. Rei repetitively practiced his apology as he headed toward Shiho's school.
The worst scenario he could then imagine was being ignored for another day. However, a greater disaster, the fruit of a conspiracy, would submerge him in guilt.
Chapter 3 TBC